Got My Mojo Workin’ – JIMMY SMITH****

High Heel Sneakers/Satisfaction/1-2-3/Mustard Greens/Got My Mojo Workin’/Johnny Come Lately/C Jam Blues/Hobson’s Hop

Hammond organ wizard Jimmy Smith achieved his final major hit album with Got My Mojo Workin'. He would continue to make the US album chart for the next few years but at much lower chart placings. (US:28 UK:19)

"Nobody, but nobody, has ever made the Hammond organ work so hard as Smith. He is the undisputed king of the jazz organ, and defined the sound of 'soul jazz' throughout the 60s. His work with arrangers such as Oliver Nelson represents the commercial peak of his long career. This album is one of many on the Verve label that it was cool to tuck under your arm and say that you owned. Smooth covers of C-Jam Blues, Satisfaction and Hi Heel Sneakers complement the originals as another entirely different way of playing them."

"The first time I heard this album was in my childhood, and I remember it as one of the most dynamic and wonderful pieces of music I have ever heard."

"This album is from my favourite Jimmy Smith period, the collaboration with Oliver Nelson's big band. While some reviewers didn't like the band, I felt that Jimmy in this context was like putting a firecracker in a velvet box. Oliver's arrangements are economical and punchy, and the band is tight, including many of the best horn players of the day. This album includes my favourite version of the oft-played C-Jam Blues, with a call-response opening that does credit to Jimmy and the band."

"One of Smith's more musically varied recordings for Verve in the mid-60s, Got My Mojo Workin' has him in both a quartet and octet setting, with excellent support from Kenny Burrell on guitar. Smith plays through a number of pop and jazz numbers, giving each a fairly southern blues sound. Many of the tracks are quite funky, but some are straight-up jazz vamps and others like 1-2-3 are simple easy listening pop pieces."

"This LP has just the right mix of everything. Jimmy's playing captures the essence of the soul-jazz which was big in the mid-1960s. He even turns songs as trivial as Len Barry's One Two Three into a funky swinger. A damned good album, with Jimmy playing like he means it. One of the finest examples of organ grindin' about."